


Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer

by blenalela



Series: we make do - Generation Kill Modern AU Christmas Edition [1]
Category: Generation Kill
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, And Christmas songs, Fluff, Frosty is back, M/M, Modern Era, christmas is around the corner, lots and lots of cheesy christmas stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:48:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21648562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blenalela/pseuds/blenalela
Summary: A certain Iceman is, not like you would guess based on his nickname, a real Grinch and would love to just have the whole holiday season erased. But with friends like Ray who never lets a chance pass to annoy his best friend and is one of the number one Christmas-Fans, Brad has to arrange himself with having his flat completely littered with everything shiny, blinking and festive.Especially since Nate seems to love all that awful stuff.
Relationships: Brad Colbert/Nate Fick
Series: we make do - Generation Kill Modern AU Christmas Edition [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1560694
Kudos: 8





	Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer

**Author's Note:**

> The first of (hopefully) four little Christmas One-Shots based on my GK - AU. I hope you have fun reading and it gets you in the Christmas Mood! :)
> 
> For better understanding you can read the rest of the series here: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1538074

** Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer **

“Where the fuck do those mistletoes come from?”

Brad looked at the little twigs in his hand as if they were a hazardous chemical weapon. Nate looked up from the box of Christmas decorations and looked over to the blond, trying not to burst out laughing as he saw Brad’s face. His eyebrows were furrowed in utter disbelief upon the monstrosity he was holding up and his eyes were filled to the brim with disgust directed to the cheesy thing.

“If I had to guess, I’d say Ray sneaked it into the box.”

“Ray Person…” the teacher said in his best ‘Dinkleberg’-voice. “I’m gonna kill him. I have to kill him.”

Nate laughed, ducking his head almost into the carton and took out the wreath for the front door. Someday, they had to buy a new one. The red color was coming off the baubles and the fir needles were dissolving into thin air.

_“Ho-ho-ho and welcome back again, elves and gnomes! Q-Tip here, ready to lead you through this wonderful afternoon in December with the best mix of Christmas songs there is. A happy Christmas from my boyfriend and Snoop Dogg, we all hope you have a wonderful time to spend with your families and friends and promise to belt out_ Last Christmas _at least once! That’s an order from one of my good friends, the one who can’t sing for shit! To start the evening, have some good old_ Mariah Carey _, the queen of cheesy Christmassy songs!”_

“Do we have to listen to Stafford today?”

“Brad, you’re a real Grinch, has anyone ever told you that?” Nate shook his head trying to hide his smile while he untangled Frosty from the silver tinsel. Maybe they shouldn’t unpack their Christmas stuff sitting on the floor. Well, if it wasn’t for people like their friends and families who completely went off the second they stepped into their completely undecorated flat, neither Nate nor Brad would’ve even thought about putting on some stuff to make it look like the, to quote a certain someone, ‘most awesome time of the whole year’.

Well, the only one who actually despised all the gaudy shit about Christmas was Brad, Nate didn’t mind it, he actually even liked it. He loved the huge fests with his and Brad’s family, the slightly littler parties with their friends and the time they would spend alone, only him and Brad and Frosty, in their apartment, listening to old Christmas tunes while drinking hot chocolate or coffee and eating cookies they got from Pappy, while they would sit on the couch, closely cuddled up with Frosty on Brad’s lap, loudly purring.

“Can we turn that off?”

“Brad, stop whining and put up the fucking tree.”

Their plastic tree was still lying on the floor, next to its stand, and the baubles were spread across the floor (thank God in their little boxes, or else Frosty would dribble them through the whole apartment; instead he was just trying to strangle himself with the tinsel).

Groaning, Brad got up and went to work on the tree. Nate went other to the front door, to put up the wreath before he was to untangle Frosty once more while Q-Tip announced _Queen_ ’s _Thank God It’s Christmas_ for a special friend (e. g. Nate). He softly started to hum the song as he carefully stuck the nail in the door to hold up their wreath.

Loud voices filled his ears standing in the hall and the moment he turned around, he was met with the figures of Walt and Ray, both covered in snow and carrying huge bags.

“Nate, my love! We brought cookies and more decorations!” With that, Ray ripped the freshly hung wreath from the door to put a new one up; one only consisting of huge, colorful baubles, and threw the old one over his shoulders. Walt picked it up, shrugging sympathetically at Nate, who was a little bit overwhelmed (well, who wasn’t with Ray’s sheer presence) while the chaos on two legs was already storming into the flat, screaming at Brad to hurry up with the fucking tree and asking him enraged if that was ‘a nasty fucking plastic thing’.

Nate shrugged at Walt as they both walked over to the now bickering friends discussing the tree.

“You can’t have a plastic tree!”

“Why the fuck not?”

“Because it’s _p l a s t i c_! It’s disgusting!”

“Have you ever looked at the prices for a real fucking tree that’s only gonna stand there for like two weeks before it starts decaying and littering the whole place with those fucking annoying and ugly and dirty excuses of leaves?”

“That’s why you don’t have it in your home the whole year but just for this one special time of the year! Plastic trees are the epitome of Grinch-Christmas!”

“How do you even know what epitome means? And have you never noticed that we are two Christmas haters?” Brad looked at Nate for support, but he was already putting on an ugly Christmas sweater Ray had bought for them all (Walt was wearing one two, other than Ray he had already taken off his coat and hat and scarf). Nate shrugged apologetically, but still pulled the thing over his head. Miraculously, the sweater fitted perfectly, though it shouldn’t be that surprising, since Ray had the key and had broken into their apartment on more than one occasion.

Brad put on puppy dog eyes. “I thought we were playing on the same team.”

Ray walked over to Nate, throwing his jacket in the direction of the coat rack and slung his arm around the lawyer’s shoulders. “No no no, Nate is playing in the right team.” His sweater had blinking lights. Well, one huge blinking light: Rudolph the reindeer’s red nose.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.” Brad helplessly unraveled Frosty and picked the cat up, trying to make his sorrow go away by stroking ‘his little baby’ (he was really referring to the cat as his little baby, Nate had heard him on more than one occasion when Brad thought nobody was there to hear him).

Nate snickered and went over to the boxes with the little electric candles for the tree. “I have to tell you Brad that Christmas is one of the best holidays there is. Even if it is cheesy. Now put Frosty down and come help us.”

Brad sighed. “Let me tell you, if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t touch one single nasty thing of this hideous and despicable shit you all call pretty.”

Concealing a laugh, Nate started to neatly roll the chains of candles out on the floor. “You’ve made that pretty obvious.”

“You too are so lovey-dovey disgusting.”

“Shut the fuck up, Ray.”

Against all beliefs, Walt and Ray’s appearance was less an obstacle than it was helpful. While Walt and Nate were occupied with putting the whole flat into a Christmassy look, Brad and Ray were decorating the tree, after deciding on getting a real one (Brad: 0; Ray: 1). Ray could really be one pain in the ass, but Nate could kiss him for getting Brad to get a real tree this year. Though the both of them didn’t really form the most harmonious pair to decorate the tree and Nate had feared for a split second to have to go to the witness stand for Brad murdering their friend with the stand, but in the end the tree looked real good this year.

Now Ray was in the kitchen, making his famous hot chocolate (basically the only thing he could make besides scrambled eggs that tasted actually really delicious) while the other three were sitting on the couch, listening to a vinyl Walt had brought from home with a mix of the greatest Christmas song from the last century and thus releasing Brad from the pain of listening to Q-Tip’s show and the ‘cancer-causing yodel-voices’ of the modern ones.

Frosty had curled up on Walt’s lap and was happily lolling around in order for the pretty blond to reach every inch of his little belly to give him little scratches. The whole flat was shining and blinking and smelling like Santa’s little workshop, much to Brad’s dismay. The most hideous thing in his opinion was the giant inflatable reindeer occupying the space next to the TV set. He didn’t even want to know where the fuck Ray found that monstrosity. Or the sweaters. Okay, he had to admit that Nate looked cute as fuck in his navy one with the huge snowman and the little white pompoms all over the front.

Walt was rocking his red one with the largely decorated Christmas tree too and where the hell Ray found one with the Grinch for him was beyond Brad. But it was Ray. Who knew where the hell he found what he found or why he searched for it in the first place.

But what Brad secretly loved was to see Nate’s eyes gleam so joyfully with all the Christmas stuff around their flat. He completely lost it when he saw the little advent wreath with the four red candles Ray had crafted for them, with little tinsels and baubles, though he concealed it pretty good. But not good enough, Brad had immediately detected how floored he was.

Maybe he should put up with all this bullshit every year. Just for Nate. (No, he would never admit just how whipped he was when it came to that little dreamer he met years ago on the streets back when Nate wanted to make it big as a singer.)

Sure, the minute Nate came through that (now sporting an ugly Christmas wreath) front door, he let his serious, almost stuck-up shell fall off of his body and got more cheerful and playful around his little family here, but especially over Christmas, they got a lot of ugly cases, though the lawyer never really talked about them (he was very secretive and closed-off when it came to his job, unlike Brad).

In this moment right now, with Nate sitting on the floor in front of Walt and Frosty, laughing heartily, Brad was so close to literally pop out a ring from nowhere and ask him to marry him (though he didn’t believe in marriage).

… If anyone ever heard these thoughts of his, he would need to change his name and emigrate to the Switzer Alps.

Loudly blaring _Feliz Navidad_ while carrying four mugs (fittingly to their sweaters: a Christmas tree for Nate, a snowman for Walt, a Grinch for Brad and a reindeer for Ray), the loud Missourian bounced over and Brad saw himself throwing their gray carpet away thanks to brown chocolate stains.

As soon as Ray was sitting on the smaller one of the couches (as always; Brad and Nate half sitting, half lying on the biggest one, and Walt in the armchair with Frosty), Nate’s body softly collided with Brad’s as he snuggled a bit closer while Ray was getting up once again to get the cookies they had gotten from Pappy and Rudy.

Then, at least three gingerbread men in his mouth, he went over to the reindeer, announcing the ‘best thing about this baby’ and plugged the cable Brad had ignored into the outlet. Instantly, the thing started shining in bright light, its nose red and from wherever the fuck, _Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer_ started playing. Loudly.

With a swift move, Brad was on his feet, making Nate almost fall flat onto the couch and threatening to spill both their drinks. His eyes fixated on Ray who was grinning like one happy little fuck and he growled various insults towards him before leaping at him with an “I knew I would have to kill you!”

Later, long after Walt and Ray were gone, together with the inflatable reindeer, Brad and Nate were lying on the couch, still listening to Walt’s record. Brad was lying all the way on the couch, with Nate on top of him and over them, they had spread a blanket Ray had given to them last year, a huge dark blue one with a Santa Claus saying ‘Ho-ho-ho’ printed on it. Frosty had curled up on top of Nate, who was half on his side, half on his stomach with his eyes half closed.

Brad had one of his hands propped up behind his head and was stroking Nate’s hair with the other. He concentrated a lot more on Nate’s even breaths than he did on _Bing Crosby_ wishing for snow. Even though he hated the silver tinsel on the two palm trees and the sideboard, the ugly cookie plate with little penguins wearing Santa hats and the obnoxiously blinking lights on their tree, he really did love the atmosphere he now had with Nate almost asleep in his arms and Frosty cuddling with both of them while he could listen to actually listenable songs instead of the atrocious stuff the radio stations, like Q-Tip, were playing.

He got startled when Nate started to stir for a short moment, oblivious to the cat on his back until said cat drilled his claws into his back. He yawned and Brad could’ve sworn that his heart just skipped a beat at how cute his sleepy Nate was (another thing to be added on the list of things that could ruin his image).

“You know you can put the music and lights and everything out, right?” Nate mumbled, squishing his face against Brad’s chest again.

Brad hummed, making Nate shiver for a split second. The taller one knew how much Nate loved it when he felt the vibrations of Brad’s deep voice while lying on his ribcage. “I actually like it.”

Nate began to chuckle and poked one of his fingers into Brad’s stomach – something he knew for sure was awful for Brad when he couldn’t move at all since he was awfully ticklish at his sides. “You don’t have to pretend just for me.”

“I’m not pretending. I just don’t hate all this huge cheesy circus all the world tends to create around Christmas. But this right here – “ he gesticulated at the three of them “ – is actually nice.”

Nate smiled and reached for Brad’s hand, giving it a light squeeze. “Me too. I don’t need more than this for Christmas.”

“Not even Ray’s inflatable Rudolph?” A huge grin spread across Brad’s face when he thought back to that ridiculous thing. Ray had prophesied to give it to Stafford and Christeson, and knowing that with less simplicity blessed annoying Christmas gnome, he would do that and knowing their friends, they’d probably put it up on their balcony for the whole neighborhood to see.

“Especially not that thing. Only Frosty and you.”

Brad pressed a kiss to the top of Nate’s head. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”


End file.
